I could see this as a military training mission: sending teams out into the jungle with little support to patrol for heavily armed hostile humans is an incredibly realistic live-fire training scenario.

The biggest problem with large creatures as rhinos and elephants is their range. Putting them into a small easily controlled pen is not exactly keeping them in their natural environment - you are just making pseudozoos. The area you need to patrol to keep them reasonably safe is therefore massive. Cutting off incredibly impoverished people from natural resources available in these parks will difficult: it is hard to see the benefit of maintaining a massive nature preserve when your child is going hungry.

That being said, Botswana would probably be the best bet. It has low levels of corruption, huge areas of wildlife, and some incredibly unique ecological areas irrespective of elephants and rhinos.A reasonably well-funded campaign could shift the economy away from grazing cattle, which would help greatly with their ecology, toward something more sustainable. It already faces a major challenge in getting away from diamond exports, so it is actively looking to remodel the economy anyway.

It would take a lot of money to make happen, for which you will be asked why it isn't spent on move impoverished people, but desertification can be reversed and huge areas of the country could be preserved as a kind of global nature preserve.

Maybe we can clone mammoths and then use northern Canada, Siberia, and other places no one wants to go. Then when someone wants to see an elephant we just make an intern shave or better yet wax, one of them.

Maybe we can clone mammoths and then use northern Canada, Siberia, and other places no one wants to go. Then when someone wants to see an elephant we just make an intern shave or better yet wax, one of them.

I'd love to see a cloned mammoth. Of course, in Canada's arctic, the polar bears are under threat of extinction from global warming. So I don't think the mammoths would fare much better in the wild.

Due to icepack loss. Terrestrial mammals don't have nearly the same threat.

Yep. Polar bears occupy a rather narrow ecological niche, of a large carnivorous mammal that roams ice-covered seas and hunts aquatic mammals like seals. When the ice disappears, there goes their niche.

Mammoths were grazers, so if they could be reintroduced they'd probably fare a bit better.

I could see this as a military training mission: sending teams out into the jungle with little support to patrol for heavily armed hostile humans is an incredibly realistic live-fire training scenario.

Exactly, you don't need an 'occupying force' because you don't need to enforce anything so much as you just need to kill people and scare the wider population from following in their footsteps. Turning these areas into a free-fire playground for Western military forces would be ideal and would give them a plentiful supply of real targets that would shoot back but could be slaughtered with impunity. African nations are laughably weak and have no real ability to resist if the developed world decides to start telling them what to do so there would be little opportunity to resist such a plan.

Of course an alternative approach could focus on population and livestock management in the at-risk areas. All that research money spent at Fort Detrick, Porton Down, and Biopreparat could finally be put to use.

It's incredibly sad that our generation might be the last to see live lions and elephants, but at the same time it's easy to sit behind a computer in a very wealthy country, and condemn people who often lack many of the basic necessities we take for granted.

Sure, many poachers are probably part of crime syndicates and not locals, but they most likely still don't have the wealth many western citizens enjoy. (Not the people being risked on poaching, anyway - further up the chain, I'm sure they have it made).

I don't buy it. If I shoot a deer, it's because I'm after the hundred or so lbs of meat I'll get from it (which is the same amount of meat I won't buy at the store) plus whatever the processor can use or sell from it. I'm not blowing away Bambi just so I can grind his antlers into boner powder.

"fair" and "balanced" is not automatically the middle between two extreme positions.

Due to icepack loss. Terrestrial mammals don't have nearly the same threat.

Yep. Polar bears occupy a rather narrow ecological niche, of a large carnivorous mammal that roams ice-covered seas and hunts aquatic mammals like seals. When the ice disappears, there goes their niche.

Mammoths were grazers, so if they could be reintroduced they'd probably fare a bit better.

We could introduce them to antarctica. The birds there can't even fly!

It's incredibly sad that our generation might be the last to see live lions and elephants, but at the same time it's easy to sit behind a computer in a very wealthy country, and condemn people who often lack many of the basic necessities we take for granted.

Sure, many poachers are probably part of crime syndicates and not locals, but they most likely still don't have the wealth many western citizens enjoy. (Not the people being risked on poaching, anyway - further up the chain, I'm sure they have it made).

I don't buy it. If I shoot a deer, it's because I'm after the hundred or so lbs of meat I'll get from it (which is the same amount of meat I won't buy at the store) plus whatever the processor can use or sell from it. I'm not blowing away Bambi just so I can grind his antlers into boner powder.

"fair" and "balanced" is not automatically the middle between two extreme positions.

Huh? Not sure what your point is. What I was getting at was that poor people in Africa don't care about the conservation of their native wildlife, since they have more immediate concerns like not starving or warlords trying to kill them.Caring about something like the extinction of elephants is something you can do when you have your basic necessities covered.

99% of the time, I don't support sending US troops to overseas locations. This would be an exception.

Assuming the African country/countries ask for our help, I think it'd be trivially easy to ask for, and receive, hundreds/thousands of volunteers amongst our military to over and help fight poachers. Make a multi-national force and it's even better.

Nations aren't exactly queuing up for an occupying force.

Yep, so I don't support having any sort of official mission. If some local game preserves can hire some American ex-mideast contractors or something for security, fine.

It'd be worth it to use the US.gov influence where ever possible to pressure/help countries that import rhino horn etc to stop that trade.

Is it time to plan for an alternative possibility and plan for when they are extinct in the wild. Have enough in zoos etc to be able to do something like we did for Bison in the US/Canada. Re-introduce them when conditions improve?

What the <bleep> is an electric fence going to do when they are being slaughtered from helicopter?

A few used Shilka SPAAGs can't be that expensive...

I think you are underestimating the size of the territory that needs protecting.It just is not plausible to establish anti-aircraft capability over half a continent, especially considering the difficulty involved with determining that any particular flight is for the purpose of poaching.

You could possibly protect small fenced in areas for a reasonable cost, but that doesn't do you much good when it comes to keeping a genetically diverse wild population.

You don't need "air control so tight, even the birds have to wear air force insignia" though - all you need is to make sure the "hunters" stand a non-zero chance of encountering certain death (and Shilka vs a helicopter is certain death for the helicopter) every time they fly somewhere.

You don't need "air control so tight, even the birds have to wear air force insignia" though - all you need is to make sure the "hunters" stand a non-zero chance of encountering certain death (and Shilka vs a helicopter is certain death for the helicopter) every time they fly somewhere.

Flying at all carries a non-zero chance of certain death.Approaching an elephant you shot to cut out the tusk carries a non-zero chance of death (it could still be just alive enough to hurt you while you are in its face).

You have to monitor a significant amount of territory - not every inch, but I will point out that the borders of the US are pretty heavily patrolled and points of entry are fairly heavily searched, yet smuggling still happens.

You have to be able to spot aircraft (non-trivial problem in undeveloped areas)Then you need to be able to conclusively identify an aircraft as being involved in a poaching operationThen intercept and engage the aircraft (and really hope you are not wrong in step 2).

You have to be able to spot aircraft (non-trivial problem in undeveloped areas)Then you need to be able to conclusively identify an aircraft as being involved in a poaching operationThen intercept and engage the aircraft (and really hope you are not wrong in step 2).

On the second point, you don't need to be that certain. This is Africa after all where 1. mistakes are easy to hide, and 2. nobody cares.

You wouldn't even need complete air defence so much as you would want some kind of monitoring. There aren't going to be that many helicopters to begin with so you find where they operate from and send in a team to shut things down in the most violent way possible or use a drone strike if you're manpower limited.

You don't need "air control so tight, even the birds have to wear air force insignia" though - all you need is to make sure the "hunters" stand a non-zero chance of encountering certain death (and Shilka vs a helicopter is certain death for the helicopter) every time they fly somewhere.

You're underestimating the size of these preserves. 36,000 square kilometers (in the case of Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park) is plenty big for a helicopter to fly around in without being noticed by authorities.

You don't need "air control so tight, even the birds have to wear air force insignia" though - all you need is to make sure the "hunters" stand a non-zero chance of encountering certain death (and Shilka vs a helicopter is certain death for the helicopter) every time they fly somewhere.

You're underestimating the size of these preserves. 36,000 square kilometers (in the case of Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park) is plenty big for a helicopter to fly around in without being noticed by authorities.

This is the inevitable result of developing societies and growing population. Unless you plan on occupying the nations in question with massive military force, you're going to see the same thing happen to elephants as happened to buffalo.

The reason we can exercise our tsk-tsk reflexes in the developed world is that we have an extremely land-dense population use. Extremely few people are engaged in large-scale agriculture to feed the masses. Most people labor is intellectual in nature.

However, you can't have large-scale agriculture without the stable legal system underpinning it. You can't have high rise luxury condos without the educational system necessary to produce droves of investment bankers to dump into them. Nor can you just will such institutions into existence - they require an underlying culture that develops over the course of generations.

If you want to save the elephants, about the only way you're going to realistically do it would be to replace the local population with latte-sipping hipsters.

Sad, though I do sympathize with people living in poverty succumbing to bribes, as it can be hard to see a wild animal being more important than providing for your family.

What I look at is the demand side. Much like the illegal drug trade in the US, you are not going to be that effective stopping a trade with such massive profitability.

Respecting other cultures and their religious beliefs is all well and good in theory, but allowing the propagation of the myth that powdered rhino horn improves virility and cures cancer is what leads to events like this.

Which reminds me of why it's a real head-scratcher when unorganized poachers go after animals. Sure, the bounty is a nice payout that can take care of your family for a year or so, but they're wild animals.

It's easy to bemoan the loss of some pretty animals, sitting over here in our air conditioning and sipping our water. If any of us were in the situation of "kill a pretty animal, or die", we would kill the animal every time.

It's easy to bemoan the loss of some pretty animals, sitting over here in our air conditioning and sipping our water. If any of us were in the situation of "kill a pretty animal, or die", we would kill the animal every time.

It's more like if any of us were in the situation of "kill a pretty animal, or lose out on $100,000 worth of black market ivory."

People in bad situations sometimes do bad things. If someone is sufficiently abused as a kid, that person may be likely to go on to abuse. But that doesn't excuse the wrong actions. IMO, a critically endangered animal is worth far more than a person on average. Killing the animal to sustain a human is a net loss. If the animal kills the human instead, it's a net gain.

People in bad situations sometimes do bad things. If someone is sufficiently abused as a kid, that person may be likely to go on to abuse. But that doesn't excuse the wrong actions. IMO, a critically endangered animal is worth far more than a person on average. Killing the animal to sustain a human is a net loss. If the animal kills the human instead, it's a net gain.

Just look over the tones in this thread and you see the recurring problem though. You subjectively recognize that "a critically endangered animal is worth far more than a person on average" but (whether or not I agree) that is a product of education and conditioning rule of law - neither of which you'll find in great abundance in the African bush. People have suggested that we institute rules and invoke property rights - and then they are told that such things aren't possible because of lack of education and rule of law. Then people say things to the effect of 'just waste the poachers with bored, western mercenaries' and the educated folks with respect for laws and national sovereignty say that you shouldn't do that and its just as barbaric.

One or two people pointed out that the problem is fundamental at the society level and I think they are correct and there is no solution that wouldn't take a generation or two to effect.

The focus on Africa is a bit off I think. In this particular case, the bulk of the demand seems to be coming from one country -- China. That country, for better or worse, seems to have pretty decent mechanism for enforcing laws that it chooses to regard as important. It's also a country that's susceptible to outside pressure on some issues (on others it is amazingly indifferent, but I don't *think* this is such an issue).

The demand is also coming from Vietnam and other countries in southeast Asia.

The easiest point in the supply chain to stop the consumption of a good is the point of least surface area. In the case of drugs, production occurs around the world, including in the countries in which they're consumed; trafficking occurs around the world along many routes, again including domestically; and consumption occurs around the world. There's no point of low surface area in the chain. That's why it's essentially impossible to stop drug use.

But in the case of endangered animal parts, consumption is widely distributed, but production is relatively more concentrated. While the animals roam over very large areas, the areas are unpopulated and thus can be monitored from the skies, and herds can be tracked to further hone in on animals' locations. Thus IMO it's easier to protect hundreds of animals by keeping poachers away from them than by stopping hundreds of millions of people across the world from paying for their parts.

The demand is also coming from Vietnam and other countries in southeast Asia.

The easiest point in the supply chain to stop the consumption of a good is the point of least surface area. In the case of drugs, production occurs around the world, including in the countries in which they're consumed; trafficking occurs around the world along many routes, again including domestically; and consumption occurs around the world. There's no point of low surface area in the chain. That's why it's essentially impossible to stop drug use.

But in the case of endangered animal parts, consumption is widely distributed, but production is relatively more concentrated. While the animals roam over very large areas, the areas are unpopulated and thus can be monitored from the skies, and herds can be tracked to further hone in on animals' locations. Thus IMO it's easier to protect hundreds of animals by keeping poachers away from them than by stopping hundreds of millions of people across the world from paying for their parts.

AFAICT, last time we stopped this problem, it was by public education, destroying demand, and closing shipping channels, not by protecting the animals.